Under My Skin

Under My Skin Volume One of My Autobiography, to 1949

Hardback (20 Oct 1994)

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Publisher's Synopsis

This first part of Doris Lessing's autobiography covers her African childhood and youth, her involvement in communist politics, and her departure for England and a new life. It is a self-portrait of a woman who lived through "an extraordinary time, the end of the British Empire in Africa".;Being lifted high up onto her father's horse, watching ostriches high-stepping over the empty distances of the Cape, travelling in ox carts to the new African farm with trunks full of Liberty material and English silver - so begins Doris Lessing's childhood.;Born in 1919, into the aftermath of World War I, Doris Lessing was the daughter of middle-class English parents lured by the false promises of the Empire Exhibition to seek their fortune in African farming. For her parents, life in dry, dusty Africa never fulfilled its expectations, but for Doris Lessing, her early life in Southern Rhodesia, with its contradictions and complexities, proved to be fundamental to her evolution as a writer.;Readers are taken through her childhood and early youth on the farm, first marriage, the rapturous births of her children, the abandonment of her family to gain independence and a political life, and her second marriage to Gottfried Lessing, an authoritarian, rigorous communist. The book ends as she loses hope of ever changing Africa, and prepares to leave for England with the manuscript of her first novel, "The Grass is Springing" - the key to a new life.

About the Publisher

HarperCollinsPublishers

HarperCollinsPublishers

With a heritage stretching back nearly 200 years, HarperCollins is one of the world's foremost English-language publishers, offering the best quality content right across the spectrum, from cutting-edge contemporary fiction to digital hymnbooks and pretty much everything in between. In the UK, the Glasgow-based William Collins & Sons was founded in 1819 and published a range of bibles, atlases and dictionaries, later including classic authors HG Wells, Agatha Christie, JRR Tolkien and CS Lewis. The original Harper Brothers Company was established in New York City in 1817 and over the years published the works of Mark Twain, the Bronte Sisters, Thackeray, Dickens, John F Kennedy and Martin Luther King Jr. In 1987, Harper & Row, as it had then become, was acquired by News Corporation. The worldwide group was formed following News Corp's 1990 acquisition of William Collins & Sons. Today we publish some of the world's foremost authors, from Nobel prize-winners to worldwide bestsellers recent successes including the Booker-winning Wolf Hall and Bring Up The Bodies by Hilary Mantel, and George RR Martin's blockbusting A Song of Ice and Fire series.

Book information

ISBN: 9780002555456
Publisher: HarperCollins Publishers
Imprint: HarperCollinsPublishers
Pub date:
DEWEY: 823.914
DEWEY edition: 20
Language: English
Number of pages: 419
Weight: 1006g
Height: 242mm
Width: 160mm
Spine width: 43mm